


Three Folktales

by virdant



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Chinese Mythology & Folklore, F/F, Folklore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-08
Updated: 2019-12-08
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:14:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21715963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/virdant/pseuds/virdant
Summary: A Marlana retelling of the Legend of Chang-E, the lady on the moon, written with three vastly-different time allowancesOr, I did that 1 minute / 10 minute / 1 hour challenge thing, and there was a lot of suffering.
Relationships: Alana Bloom/Margot Verger
Comments: 9
Kudos: 11





	1. 1 Hour

**Author's Note:**

> There's this challenge thing that's going around where you [produce the same piece of work in three vastly different time-frames](https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=1+minute+10+minutes+1+hour), and me being me, I decided that I like suffering.
> 
> So I wrote a Marlana retelling of the Legend of Chang-E in 1 minute, 10 minutes, and 1 hour. I've uploaded them in the opposite order that I wrote them so the first chapter is actually decent, but please do click through and read the oops-I-ran-out-of-time 10 minute version and the oh-shit-i-only-have-one-minute 1 minute version.
> 
> Please note that I literally did not touch the work after the time allotment, so any mistakes are mistakes that existed during the writing of the document.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Marlana retelling of the Legend of Chang-E, written (and edited) in 1 hour.

Once upon a time, in a land much like this one, but younger, there was a man who became king. He was a cruel man, who enjoyed slaughtering for sport, who pinched his sister until she bruised, who tormented his servants.

His name was Mason, and he had been king for a long time.

Mason lived in a vast castle overlooking the kingdom. It had everything he could want: the finest foods, the most luxurious silks, the fastest horses in the land. It had everything he could want, and still, he wanted more.

He demanded more tithes than the people could provide, and they starved in the fields. He demanded feasts beyond what he could eat, and left the food to rot. He demanded gold and silver and gems, and crushed them underfoot.

But Mason’s favorite thing in the world was to torment his sister Margot.

He pinched her until she bruised, he snatched plates of food away before she could eat, he offered her clothes and bedding and laughed when he burned them before her. Margot watched it all happen without a word, because Mason was king, and his word was law. She had tried to protest once, and all that happened was Mason grew more cruel, and the servants around more haunted. So, she would stand still while he pinched her, she would press her mouth closed when he took her plate before she could eat, she would let the fire warm her and carry that warmth with her in memory.

The only freedom she had was at night when she took the horses and rode, fast and far across the fields. She would chase the moonlight, racing to keep it on her side. She would let it run its fingers through her hair, press promises to her fingers. She would chase it as it rose, keep it company as it made its journey across the valleys. But in the end, the moon would set, and she would have to turn back and return: to Mason, whose mouth was always upturned in cruel delight.

“Margot, Margot, Margot,” Mason sang, “Of course you came back. Where else would you go?”

And Margot would stare back at him and count the days before he died.

The days passed like this, one after another, and Mason grew older day after day. “Margot, Margot, Margot,” he sang, after she returned from a long ride, across fields, through valleys, with the moon at her side. “Margot, welcome home.”

She stared at him, because this castle was not home, and she was silent.

“Nothing to say, dear sister?” He spread his arms in a facsimile of warmth. “And here, I waited for you to return.”

She said, “You didn’t have to wait.”

He smiled, wider. It was not any kinder. “And leave you all alone? How could I, your dear brother, let that happen?”

And this time, Margot was not silent, and she said, “When you die.” She did not say, “And I will be with the moon.”

Mason said, “You’d want that, wouldn’t you.” And his eyes were dark with fury, even as his voice lilted. “Don’t worry, Margot. I won’t let that happen.”

“Everybody dies.”

“I won’t.”

And that day, Mason began his search for eternal life to ensure his sister would never be free from his torment. He sent his people searching far and wide: for fountains of youth, for remedies that would cure any illness, for spells that would keep him young and ageless. Day after day, his people scoured the land. Day after day, his people reported that they had found nothing.

“When you die,” Margot would say, before she would leave to ride with the moon.

“I won’t,” Mason would repeat, and his voice would be a snarl.

The days passed like this, one after another, and Mason grew older and older, and Margot as well. Each day, Margot prayed that nobody would come bearing good news, and each night, Margot rode into the moonlight with an arm full of fresh bruises from Mason’s pinched fury.

Until one day, a man named Cordell returned. Cordell was a cruel man, with a smile to match Mason’s. He came dragging a woman behind him, fair skin and dark hair, with lips as red as blood.

“Your Majesty,” Cordell crowed, “I have brought what you seek!”

“A woman,” Mason drawled.

“Not _just_ a woman.” Cordell shook her by the arm, and her entire body seemed to rattle from the force. “She knows the secret to eternal life!”

Margot met the woman’s eyes.

“Is that true?” Mason breathed.

“Yes,” Cordell said, puzzled. “I just said—”

“Shut up, Cordell, I wasn’t talking to you.”

The woman blinked, slowly.

Mason said, to the woman, “What’s your name?”

The woman looked at Mason, and then said, her eyes fixed on Margot’s, “My name is Alana.”

“And do you know the secret to eternal life?”

She said, “Nobody knows the meaning of life, let along an eternal one.”

“But do you know how to make me immortal,” Mason demanded.

She was still looking at Margot when she said, “Yes.”

He demanded: “What is it?”

“Don’t tell him,” Margot mouthed. “Don’t—”

Alana, still with her arm twisted in Cordell’s meaty fist, looked away. She reached into her pocket, and removed a bottle filled with dozens of tiny pills. 

“What is it?”

“This is the secret to immortality.” Alana didn’t look away from Margot. “One pill will grant you eternal life. But take more than one, and you will never walk on this land again.”

Mason’s eyes lit with glee. He snatched the bottle from Alana’s hand. “One for me, and one for you, dear sister.”

Alana’s eyes met Margot’s again, and there was something familiar in her gaze. 

Margot said, “Wait.”

He smirked. “Why wait?”

Alana looked at Margot, and her voice was slow and careful as she said, “The day you become immortal will go down in history. Shouldn’t it be celebrated, with feasting and dancing?” She looked at the bottle in Mason’s hand. “After all, you have the pills now. What’s a few days more?”

Mason’s smile grew. “Quite right.” He held the bottle in his fist. “What’s a few days more?”

And so it was decided, that in a week’s time, all the people in the land would gather at the palace to celebrate Mason’s eternal rule, and on that day, Mason and Margot would become immortal.

Margot said, “I’d rather die.”

“No chance of that happening,” Mason retorted.

And Margot didn’t reply.

One night passed, and then more. One after another, the castle bustled, making preparations for feasting and celebration. Every day, Mason kept the bottle of pills tucked in his pocket, and every night, he placed it under his pillow lest it be stolen. “Margot,” he purred, “Aren’t you looking forward to eternal life?”

Margot thought of smashing the bottle against his face and said nothing.

The day before the celebration, Alana called for a celebration. “Your last day as a mortal,” she said, and her eyes held promises as she looked at Margot. “Shouldn’t you celebrate?” She poured wine, and kept pouring. 

Mason smirked back. “Won’t you drink as well, Margot?”

“I’m not thirsty,” Margot replied. She didn’t look at the wine.

Mason drank, and drank. Margot watched, with the same steady gaze she had watched with growing up. She watched with the same steady gaze she had watched that morning, when Alana had prepared the wine. She watched as Mason drank until he could no longer keep his eyes open. She watched as Mason stumbled to bed with the bottle in hand.

That night, Alana came to Margot. Her dark hair was swept to the side, leaving the moonlight luminous on the pale skin of her cheek. “Margot,” she whispered, “wake up.”

Margot woke.

“This is the last night,” Alana whispered. “If you are going to do anything, you must do it now.”

Margot looked at Alana, and whispered back, “Why did you give them to him?”

“I gave them to you.”

Margot stared. “Why?”

She looked at her, a smile as secretive as the moon, and whispered, “Hurry.”

And Margot hurried. She had grown up in this castle, and she knew where she could run, and where she had to step silently to keep the floors from creaking. She knew how to opens doors silently, and how to creep without waking anybody. She hurried until she stood beside Mason’s bed, and she knew she could strangle him in that instant.

Instead, she slipped the bottle from his pillow.

“You cannot let him become immortal,” Alana had whispered that morning.

“I know.” 

She held the bottle in her hands. They trembled as she poured the pills into her hand. When she turned to slip the bottle back under the pillow, they trembled so hard they jostled Mason’s head. 

Mason woke. “Margot,” he slurred. “What are you doing, dear Margot?”

“Nothing,” she said.

“What have you got there?” His eyes sharpened. “What have you got, Margot?”

“Nothing,” she said, and she clutched the pills tighter.

“Don’t like to me.” Mason reached.

Margot watched the hand approach. Mason had always been bigger and stronger than her. If he tried, he could take the pills from her, and become immortal.

There was only one option to ensure his death.

She shoved the pills into her mouth and swallowed.

“What did you do, Margot?” Mason shouted. “What did you do?”

Margot stared back. She said nothing.

“I’ll kill you,” Mason hissed. He rattled the empty bottle. “I’ll kill you!”

Margot didn’t smile. She just stood.

“I’ll kill you, Margot!”

She finally said, “You won’t.”

When Mason swiped at her, Margot’s feet left the ground. When he lunged, she floated away. Higher and higher, through the window, across fields and valleys, always towards the moon. She watched as Mason faded from view, as she flew higher and higher until she stood on the surface of the moon.

Alana looked at her, her smile soft: dark as the far side of the moon, luminous as moonlight. “Margot,” she said.

“Alana,” Margot replied.

“You’re home,” she said, and held Margot close. “You never have to go back.”


	2. 10 Minutes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Marlana retelling of Chang-E, written in 10 minutes!
> 
> Also known as "Oops I ran out of time" so it's incomplete because 10 minutes is actually not long enough to write things like dialogue.

Once upon a time, there lived a man named Mason and his sister, Margot. The man was a cruel man, who had become king of the land, and he ruled through fear. 

Margot lived in fear of Mason and his cruel ways. She crept through the halls, hoping to avoid being noticed, in fear that Mason would find her and torment her. Her only solace was when she left the house to ride across the land, sweeping across the fields on horseback.

Mason was king, but he wasn’t satisfied. For he knew that one day, he would die, and then he would be king no longer. But he heard rumors of pills that could grant immortality, and so he set his people searching near and far. He searched day and night, until one day—

A man named Cordell, a wide-set man with a grin just as cruel as Mason’s, approached. “Your Majesty,” he declared, “I have found the pills.” And so he had, for he had brought with him a woman who clutched a cane in one hand, and kept her other hand tucked into the pocket of her trousers, as if to hold a secret safe.

Mason grinned, a twin to Cordell’s. “I only see a woman.”

The woman’s name was Alana Bloom, and she held the secret to immortality, one that had been entrusted to her by her teacher in the past. In her pocket, she had a jar filled with dozens of tiny pills. “One will allow you to live forever,” she said, holding it up in her delicate fingers. “But more than one, and you will never step foot on this Earth again.”

“Well,” Mason said. “Hand them over.”

But Alana Bloom knew he was a cruel man, and so she hesitated. 

“Cordell,” Mason said.

Cordell snatched the pills from her, his hand so tight around her wrist that she thought it might break.

Mason held the bottle with avarice. “With this,” he declared, “I will be king forever!” 

Alana looked at him, and knew that he would be a cruel king. “Yes,” she said, and her mind spun. “But such a deed deserves to be celebrated. You should summon all of the people to watch you become immortal, and celebrate with feasting and dancing.”

And Mason, who was a cruel king who wanted everything, agreed.

And so it was decided, that in a week’s time, everybody in the land would gather to feast and celebrate, and then, in the midst of the people, Mason would take a single pill and become immortal.

But Margot, in the shadows, had heard everything. That night, she crept to Alana and whispered, “We cannot let him become immortal.”

Alana looked at her. “Who are you?” she whispered back.

“Margot,” she said. “Mason’s sister. Please, you can’t let him become immortal.”


	3. 1 Minute

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 1 minute is very little time.

Once upon a time Margot lived with her brother Mason. Mason was a cruel man who had somehow become the ruler of the land. Mason wanted immortality, so he got pills of immortality from an asshole named Cordell. Margot decided this was terrible so she stole the pills. But Mason found out, and when he confronted her, Margot shoved all of them in her mouth and swallowed, and then flew to the moon.

**Author's Note:**

> I actually did screen-record this entire suffering process because i was curious so you know, hit me up if you want to watch over an hour of typing without any comment.
> 
> ❤️ Enjoyed it? Try the following options:
> 
>   * Follow me on twitter [@virdant](http://virdant.twitter.com)
>   * [Like & retweet on twitter](https://twitter.com/virdant/status/1203578053642711040?s=20)
>   * Comment and kudo below
> 



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